Features

A Summer Q&A

Once again, it’s that time of year where we cast our nets wide and ask Canadian musicians across our community what they’re looking forward to this summer, both as listeners and performers, and what their plans are for the season ahead.

Every year it’s the same four questions – and yet, they call forth an array of responses as varied and unique as the musicians themselves. With dozens of replies from correspondents both returning and brand-new, and more responses pouring in every day, click here to read what “On-The-Roaders” in the area have to say about their summer plans. This feature will continue to be updated throughout the year, so be sure to check in to see where these musicians’ summer travels take them.

After eight days of pulling hair, and cursing hackers, TheWholeNote.com is BACK! And with a new template in place, the basic layout already feels cleaner and easier. We realize that some things are not exactly where they were in the previous website and that some utility has been temporarily lost, and that there will be ups and downs moving ahead. If you find any problems with the website, please do email me at systems@thewholenote.com in as much detail as you like to describe the problem.

We thank you for your patience and input during this time of difficulty. There will be bugs, we're sure, but, with your help, we’ll swat ’em as they arise.

Thanks again!
Bryson Winchester
Webmaster of TheWholeNote.com

The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men, 
Gang aft agley, 
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, 
For promis'd joy! 
(The best laid schemes of Mice and Men
oft go awry,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!)

Robert Burns, To a Mouse (Poem, November, 1785)
Scottish national poet (1759 - 1796)

We Goofed, Pure and Simple, and We are Sorry

The Friday June 7 “Star of Robbie Burns” ad above although submitted in good time as part of a carefully planned campaign was inexplicably omitted from the May issue of The WholeNote.

Like Burn’s proverbial “Red red rose, newly sprung in June” “Star of Robbie Burns” promises to be a lovely leap into the summer.  Stay tuned for more details about the event, including an opportunity to win tickets, by liking us on Facebook, following us on Twitter, or registering on our website to receive our regular “e-letter.”

So why is it that a cappella singing feels less intimidating than singing in a choir?

AARON JENSEN, artistic director of SING!:When many people hear the phrase “a cappella” they think Glee — visions of spirited high school students recklessly brandishing “jazz hands” (or the even more saccharine, “spirit fingers”) and belting out triadic auto-tuned harmonies with bravado — but the term has much older roots. “A cappella,” literally meaning “in the manner of the chapel,” refers to all vocal music performed with no instrumental accompaniment. This umbrella term covers the music of countless styles, genres and cultural backgrounds.

Even though SING! is an a cappella festival, we’ve branded ourselves as a “vocal arts” festival to best represent this diversity. Under our roof, patrons can hear all manner of a cappella including: classical choral groups, vocal jazzers, gospel choirs, world ensembles, live-looping artists, pop vocal bands, barbershop quartets, collegiate glee-clubbers, vocal improv collectives and even a cappella comedy troupes.

So does a festival like SING! help to bridge the gulf (if there is one) between solo and choral singing? What’s in it for people coming from a more formal (if that’s the right word) choral background? And on the other hand, for bathtub divas what does it say about the potential joys of showering with a few friends?

Wayne Koestenbaum in his seminal 1993 book, The Queen’s Throat: Opera, Homosexuality and the Mystery of Desire, defines “diva” as “a woman opera singer of great fame and brilliance.” While the main focus of the book is the link between opera and homosexuality, Koestenbaum also gives illustrations of radical fandom and diva worship.

My absolute favourite story in Koestenbaum’s book concerns the English sisters, Ida and Louise Cook, who developed fanatic attachments to Amelita Galli-Curci and Rosa Ponselle, both of whom they befriended. The best part of the story is that the Cook sisters were instrumental in smuggling Jews out of Nazi territories during World War II. Yet rather than basking in their heroism, Ida, in her memoir, We Followed Our Stars, lamented that their war-work “cost us Ponselle’s Donna Anna, Carmen, Luisa Miller and Africana. That was what mattered.”